


Moving Forward

by ticklishivories



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Light Angst, Post-Trespasser
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-23
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-10-26 12:09:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20741978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ticklishivories/pseuds/ticklishivories
Summary: Braelith meets with her clan before setting off for Tevinter.





	Moving Forward

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hallabutter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hallabutter/gifts).

> Braelith belongs to hallabutter :)

Braelith closes her eyes.

It’s quiet here. Deafening– no echoing clangs of battleaxes slamming into wooden posts, no shouting, no despairing cries. She listens, and hears distant, squealing laughter, and the small nicker of a content halla. She feels the breeze carry over from the Waking Sea, the salt on her skin and tongue and the tall, untamed grass rippling freely through her undone hair. It’s been a long time since she’s let it down.

“You’ve always had such beautiful hair,” Deshanna says somewhat solemnly, coming to stand behind her. “I always loved when you let it out of your braids.”

“It just gets in the way,” Braelith sighs, and as she says it a strand gets caught between her lips. She tries to sift it out with her left hand, but the absence of motion makes the empty space where her arm once was lurch with phantom pain. She bites her lip, snagging and taming the feeling before it escapes. Deshanna sighs through her nose, then comes to her side, taking her face briefly within her cool hands before tucking the loose strand behind her ear.

“There’s so little time,” she murmurs. Braelith holds her gaze steadily. “Enjoy it with them.”

There’s no room to argue.

Deshanna leads her to return to the campsite, holding her hand loosely, using her other to grip her staff as she trudges up the hill through the grass.

It’d been hard spending the day with the clan. Braelith felt herself choke back tears every time someone hugged her, or a child gazed at her with unfamiliarity, or a teen stared at her with forlorn recognition. Everyone knows.

She had just…needed a breather.

But Deshanna drags her back, her smooth palm an anchor she can trust.

The children are the first to swarm, followed by the halla. And with the halla always follows her father. He doesn’t stand as straight as Braelith remembers, and there are shadows hanging like drapes from under his eyes. He’s aged– but the soft glint in his smile hasn’t changed a bit. When Braelith looks at him, her worries somehow melt, and triple tenfold.

“It seems you’ll be taller than me within the season’s end,” he says, his voice deeper, more wispy. Braelith smiles. Deshanna drops her hand, taking a step away to let her have this moment.

“You know I stopped growing years ago.”

“Did you? Would’ve believed you ten meters tall from the rumors spread around like brushfire.”

“Well, I’ve definitely been brought down a peg these last few months.” She nods towards her missing arm.

“No such thing.”

There’s no sadness in his eyes when he looks at her, so Braelith decides she needn’t feel any either. A halla nudges Braelith’s hand and she laughs, giving in to stroke its snout before it returns to her father’s side.

From behind him, another face pops out.

“Mihla…!”

Mihla grins wickedly.

“Thought you could disappear without saying goodbye again, hm?”

The way in which she peeks out from behind her father reminds Braelith of the games they used to play, so fond and so long ago that her heart aches. “No. Never.”

It’s so much worse than last time.

Will she ever see their faces again? Will she have the time, in between hunting down a man every sane being in Thedas has titled a monster, a man who she sometimes still sees glimpses of in her dreams?

Braelith closes that lid tightly shut, and smiles at her.

“I’d bottle you all up and take you with me if I could,” she says, glancing between her and her father, and then Deshanna, watching quietly in the background. Around her, the clan prepares for a twilit supper, the sun threatening its descent upon the horizon. Orange sets the sky ablaze. Braelith sighs. “But it’s just too treacherous a journey.”

“Please, who in their right mind would go on a camping trip with you?” Mihla says, shocking Braelith and her father. “You’re the most powerful woman in the Inquisition and you lost an arm! Sweet things like me and daddy here would be eaten up like twigs on a spit.”

Braelith can’t help it; the tension she’d been holding within snaps like a splinter. She bursts into laughter, loud and ringing, calling the attention of the rest of the clan. The new First glances at her somewhat nervously, his young, inexperienced face exposing every fracture of emotion. She reminds herself not to think such thoughts. He will be the new Keeper, the new protector of her clan. And though they exchanged few words in their meeting earlier that day, she believes he possesses the power to guide and protect the people she loves.

Her beloved, precious family.

“I do love you all,” she says, reaching for her sister’s hand and squeezing. Her father places a hand on her shoulder. Its large, calloused exterior reminds her of being a little girl, him telling her old stories by the dying hearth.

“As do we,” he says, grinning, his eyes watery.

“Don’t get all weepy on us,” Mihla says. “If dad cries, we’ll all cry.”

Mihla has to stretch on her toes to wrap her arms around Braelith. Braelith holds her tightly, breathing in the sweet fragrance of her hair, the earthy freshness of her skin. Mihla has always smelled like home.

Whispering in her ear, Mihla says something only for her.

“You’ll be fantastic, just like you’ve always been,” she mutters. “The future is in your hands– excuse me, hand.”

Braelith chuckles, her voice breaking ever so slightly.

“And Gods above. The muscles in your back are incredible.”

Braelith snorts on a high laugh. “I’ll miss you, too.”

Terrible, sweet sister.

Loving, kind father.  
She has to say goodbye.

…But she can’t.

She can only say thank you. Only hold them tighter, linger a little bit longer. The more she stays, the more she knows it will hurt.

It’s Deshanna who grasps her hand again, who guides Braelith away from the giggling children, their endless questions, the curious halla, needing to be in the middle of the commotion. It’s Deshanna who pulls her head out of the clouds and takes her back to the lonely hilltop.

It’s there that Braelith can see everything.

The sails of the aravels, flapping lazily in the wind. The fires on the campsite as they’re lit for supper. The smiles she’s fought for, the laughter her friends have died for.

“The trials you’ve endured have been…innumerable,” Deshanna murmurs.

The distant sight of the clan dissolves into a watery blur. It’s time for the final goodbye.

“I knew this, and yet I pushed more into your path.” The lines ageing her pale face seem to deepen as a shadow overtakes her. “I am sorry.”

“You did no such thing,” Braelith says, her gaze falling to the long green grass squished under her feet. She recalls their last meeting, so many months ago, Deshanna’s last, and seemingly final, cold words to her.

_ I’m disappointed._

There’s no _I told you so _in Deshanna’s eyes, now. No pity. Just sorrow– heavy, aching sorrow that makes Braelith want to burst apart.

A tiny smile pulls at Deshanna’s lips. “You are meant for great things.”

Braelith looks upon her, the sadness underlying her gleaming eyes, and shakes her head. “Nothing should be greater than family.”

“You won’t be without.” Deshanna gestures over her shoulder; behind them is a small gathering of onlookers, watching the two standing upon the hilltop together. It’s her sister, side by side with their father, as well as the newly appointed first, shyly glancing between Braelith and Deshanna. It’s obvious that the rest of the clan is trying to watch over the two, sneaking glances while they cook and set up tents. All the children betray their anxiousness, worriedly peering at the adults but too afraid to question what’s happening. Braelith’s eyes well with emotion.

When will she able to gaze upon their faces again? Will she smell the distant ocean, witness the snowcapped mountains, or hear the cries of the newborn hallas soon, if ever again?

“I can’t…I can’t say goodbye yet,” she says, turning her head away, the sight nearly unbearable. She clutches her stomach as it roils. “I’ve dreamt of this, known it was coming, and yet…yet I lack the courage to properly–”

“If you think you’re never seeing us again, then you haven’t been listening to my teachings.” Deshanna grins, her slim hand dropping to Braelith’s arm. “But I know first hand how untrue that is.”

Braelith looks at her Keeper. Her smile is laced with sadness, but not burdened by it. Hope and pride gleam like stars in the corners.

Deshanna reaches into her pocket. From it she removes a small object, and gently takes Braelith’s hand once more. When she slides a ring onto her index finger, Braelith gasps softly.

“I realize that you’ll be far from us,” Deshanna begins, as Braelith brings the ring up to admire it closely, her heart beating and her breath thin and light in her lungs. She knows exactly what this ring is. “But…I thought, if you had this, maybe it’d remind you to keep your head.”

“Oh, Deshanna…”

“Remember your duty to your clan.”

Deshanna’s voice is like steel, but Braelith doesn’t miss the glisten in her eyes, and does everything she can to not lose her grip on herself as well. And she nearly does when Deshanna pulls her into her arms, holding her loosely.

It was one moment, but she stays in it for a thousand more.

_I’ll dream of you,_ she thinks to herself as she rides away in the night. She thinks of her clan, how they waved as she mounted her horse, and kept waving until they were long out of sight. She thinks of how she smiled until her lips trembled.

_“No matter where you are,” _Deshanna had said, her words carrying Braelith through the long, endless miles, the burning cities, the empty chase, _“wherever the world takes you– you are Dalish. You are family.”_

Braelith turns her sight to the stars, searching for the ones she grew up wondering and dreaming with.

_You always will be._


End file.
